Pages

Tuesday, May 24, 2005

Rational Conference Report 4

A busy day yesterday, with lots of good conversations not just about Rational but about Tivoli and other stuff as well. But by 6pm Vegas time the jet lag had caught up with me, and I was too tired to respond when Alan Brown walked by and said hi. (Sorry Alan if you're reading this.)

This is the first time I've blogged live from an event like this, and it's interesting to hear the reaction. One IBM person thought I was being a bit negative in places. But I think my general line is that IBM is doing some exciting stuff - it's on a journey, and there's some way to go. I probably spend more time talking about the outstanding opportunities than about the achievements to date, but I don't see anything wrong with that.

Product Architecture and Brand Identity

I've been urged not to make too much of the difference between brand names. It doesn't really matter whether a product is branded as Rational or Websphere or Tivoli. Hm.

It is doubtless the case today that there are some disconnects within the software industry - notably between development and operations. So it is not surprising that these disconnects are reflected by different product/solution offerings from IBM, under different brand names. Tivoli and Rational are being marketed to different kinds of customer, addressing different kinds of problem.

But if IBM want to make a serious contribution to reducing these disconnects, it must find a way of bringing these communities together. I've been hearing about some of the cr0ss-product initiatives between the different product groups within IBM, but eventually this collaboration has got to be reflected outside IBM as well as inside.